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Hard-partying caddie Duplantis `throwback to livelier era'

As a kid, Steve Duplantis used to stay home from school on the opening day of golf season, just to make sure he was the first person to tee off each spring at the North Halton Golf Club.

As an adult, he channelled his love of golf into his career as a caddie. Duplantis, who died Wednesday after being hit by a taxi outside San Diego, gained a reputation as one of the hardest partiers on the PGA Tour, but he also earned a rep as one of its best caddies.

"He knew where the pin positions were, he knew the yardages and he knew how to play the wind," says Bob Hebert, a long-time family friend. "He basically knew the players' games as well as they knew them."

According to local police, the 35-year-old Duplantis was crossing a street in Del Mar, just north of San Diego, on Wednesday when he stepped off a median and into the path of a taxi. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

Duplantis, who was born in Brampton and learned to golf in Georgetown, was in San Diego for the PGA Buick Invitational, where news of his death hit his fellow caddies hard.

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As the tournament's first round teed off, PGA officials phoned Duplantis's family in Canada, asking about setting up a trust fund for his 12-year-old daughter Sierra. They also said the caddies planned to wear black armbands this weekend in Duplantis's honour.

Seven years ago, Sports Illustrated writer Alan Shipnuck spent a season with Duplantis and PGA pro Rich Beem while writing a book titled Bud, Sweat & Tees: A Walk on the Wild Side of the PGA Tour.

Writing for golf.com yesterday, Shipnuck remembered a caddie whose golf knowledge and personality overshadowed his love of the nightlife.

"He was a throwback to an earlier, livelier era when professional caddies were a fun-loving, hard-living bunch," Shipnuck wrote. "As big money changed the nature of the profession in the last decade, Steve had struggled to find his place, unable to hold down a steady bag. No doubt his reputation for partying didn't help. But as often as Steve was fired through the years, he had no shortage of friends on Tour. He had a good heart and it was impossible not to like him, no matter how often he screwed up."

Duplantis joined the caddie fraternity in 1994, but his roots in golf run much deeper.

His dad, Steve Duplantis Sr., remembers sawing off a club to make it short enough for his then 4-year-old son to use. He gave Duplantis a left-handed club because he was a lefty in hockey, but figured his son would switch to right-handed when he grew.

But he never changed.

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"He got the bug early, and he was hard-headed (about playing left-handed)," Steve Sr. said.

Eight years later, Steve Sr. was volunteering at the Canadian Open, shuttling players from the course to their hotels and back. One morning he dropped off Duplantis at a clinic for young players and instructed him not to bother any of the pros.

When Steve Sr. returned, Duplantis had an armful of souvenirs from PGA pro Clarence Rose, whom he had followed the entire day.

The two stayed in touch and in 1993 Rose, then playing on the Nationwide tour, gave Duplantis a summer job as his caddie. The next summer Duplantis worked for Rose again, but stepped aside when Rose entered the Anheuser-Busch Classic in Washington, D.C. Long before, Rose had promised that his brother-in-law could caddie that weekend.

At the same time Jim Furyk, then a struggling PGA rookie, arrived at the tournament alone. His caddie had stood him up, but Furyk quickly noticed Duplantis was alone and approached him.

"Grab my bag," Furyk said to Duplantis. "You're on the tee."

Furyk hadn't made a cut in more than a month, but he finished in the top 10 that weekend. He and Duplantis stayed together for four more years.

"When he had weeks off it drove him nuts," Steve Sr. says. "He'd rather have been out there."

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